The Lemon Fool

Snorvey wrote:Yep, UK wind energy records broken yesterday..

https://mobile.twitter.com/NationalGrid ... 5118189575

And a minute ago wind was generating less than 1.2GW of our power. CCGT presently generating almost 2/3 with nuclear a rather pathetic 1/10 of current demand. We so desperately need far more real grid scale energy storage.

BullDog wrote:

Snorvey wrote:Yep, UK wind energy records broken yesterday..

https://mobile.twitter.com/NationalGrid ... 5118189575

And a minute ago wind was generating less than 1.2GW of our power. CCGT presently generating almost 2/3 with nuclear a rather pathetic 1/10 of current demand. We so desperately need far more real grid scale energy storage.

That is the problem with wind turbines. Often when you really need the energy, the turbines are not working because the conditions are flat calm and in winter freezing cold! Conditions like I have today with a nice area of high pressure over us. And then we had SSE having to pay others because they could not fulfil their contracts to supply the energy (as disclosed in their Half Year report)

Hydro electric needs to be promoted more so that Drax builds a second Cruachan and SSE is allowed to develop its plans as well. I do not understand why it takes so long to get planning permission approved for these schemes. We should be like Kate Bingham and her procurement of vaccines. This is supposed to be an energy emergency. Referring to Kate Bingham again, I guess those who approve the planning apps are more interested in process than result.

Dod

Dod101 wrote:

BullDog wrote:

Snorvey wrote:Yep, UK wind energy records broken yesterday..

https://mobile.twitter.com/NationalGrid ... 5118189575

And a minute ago wind was generating less than 1.2GW of our power. CCGT presently generating almost 2/3 with nuclear a rather pathetic 1/10 of current demand. We so desperately need far more real grid scale energy storage.

That is the problem with wind turbines. Often when you really need the energy, the turbines are not working because the conditions are flat calm and in winter freezing cold! Conditions like I have today with a nice area of high pressure over us. And then we had SSE having to pay others because they could not fulfil their contracts to supply the energy (as disclosed in their Half Year report)

Hydro electric needs to be promoted more so that Drax builds a second Cruachan and SSE is allowed to develop its plans as well. I do not understand why it takes so long to get planning permission approved for these schemes. We should be like Kate Bingham and her procurement of vaccines. This is supposed to be an energy emergency. Referring to Kate Bingham again, I guess those who approve the planning apps are more interested in process than result.

Dod

SSE have an oven ready project of 1500MW pumped storage in the form of Coire Glas ( https://www.coireglas.com/project ), all that's needed is the government to get its finger out and sort out the financial terms for the power generated that will allow the project to be financially viable.

daveh wrote:

Dod101 wrote:

BullDog wrote:

Snorvey wrote:Yep, UK wind energy records broken yesterday..

https://mobile.twitter.com/NationalGrid ... 5118189575

And a minute ago wind was generating less than 1.2GW of our power. CCGT presently generating almost 2/3 with nuclear a rather pathetic 1/10 of current demand. We so desperately need far more real grid scale energy storage.

That is the problem with wind turbines. Often when you really need the energy, the turbines are not working because the conditions are flat calm and in winter freezing cold! Conditions like I have today with a nice area of high pressure over us. And then we had SSE having to pay others because they could not fulfil their contracts to supply the energy (as disclosed in their Half Year report)

Hydro electric needs to be promoted more so that Drax builds a second Cruachan and SSE is allowed to develop its plans as well. I do not understand why it takes so long to get planning permission approved for these schemes. We should be like Kate Bingham and her procurement of vaccines. This is supposed to be an energy emergency. Referring to Kate Bingham again, I guess those who approve the planning apps are more interested in process than result.

Dod

SSE have an oven ready project of 1500MW pumped storage in the form of Coire Glas ( https://www.coireglas.com/project ), all that's needed is the government to get its finger out and sort out the financial terms for the power generated that will allow the project to be financially viable.

Indeed. That is the one I was thinking of. It is even worse if planning permission is no issue but simply how to reward the spoils. Mind you, there has been so much fuss about the Covid emergency financial arrangements that Government or at least the Civil Servants involved are probably terrified to do anything as someone is bound to criticise them for agreeing to pay too much.

Dod

Well as they're talking about turning the lights out tonight. Coir Glas mught be a hogher priority than it has been.

Better get some fuel for the genny.

DrFfybes wrote:Well as they're talking about turning the lights out tonight. Coir Glas mught be a hogher priority than it has been.

Better get some fuel for the genny.

Not to mention what should be the UK's #1 source[1]. Tidal power.

[1] Unless you count energy saving as a source. Which we do, for example, when we describe heat pumps as renewable energy.

Useless for wind turbines though.

Indeed. Wind turbines are presently generating about 2% of UK load. Less than 1GW.

Edited- Funny thing. We currently have about 2x coal fired generation than wind. You know, those 50+ year old polluting dinosaurs we were trying to eliminate?

UncleEbenezer wrote:Not to mention what should be the UK's #1 source[1]. Tidal power.

Having spent several years working at a Marine Research place in Devon, and met a few people involved in wave and tidal generation, including doing trackdays with ones who've thrown 7 figures of their own money into it, it is unlikely to become an economically viable production method any time soon.

Last time we chatted, setup and maintenance costs make it more than 10 fold more expensive than wind turbines.

Paul

DrFfybes wrote:

UncleEbenezer wrote:Not to mention what should be the UK's #1 source[1]. Tidal power.

Last time we chatted, setup and maintenance costs make it more than 10 fold more expensive than wind turbines.

Paul

Not surprising. Wind power has a generation's head start in developing and deploying the technology and bringing costs down. But also has the huge intermittency problem.

Wind power - like oil before it - had the help of supportive governments on that R&D curve. Tidal hasn't: there's no other country in the world whose tidal resource dominates available renewables like Blighty, so it should have been our government taking the lead in supporting it.

We're finally seeing some progress. For example, see https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... lity-flows

UncleEbenezer wrote:

DrFfybes wrote:

UncleEbenezer wrote:Not to mention what should be the UK's #1 source[1]. Tidal power.

Last time we chatted, setup and maintenance costs make it more than 10 fold more expensive than wind turbines.

Not surprising. Wind power has a generation's head start in developing and deploying the technology and bringing costs down. ...there's no other country in the world whose tidal resource dominates available renewables like Blighty, so it should have been our government taking the lead in supporting it.
We're finally seeing some progress. For example, see https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... lity-flows

Where it says... ... at the end of last year the ministers allocated £20m worth of funding to the sector, under the government’s “contract for difference” scheme, which provides a guaranteed price for renewable energy. Four commercial-scale tidal energy bids, including two from Orbital Marine and one from Simec Atlantis, were successful.
Well, Simec's SP is now in the pennies.... It's a long hard road for mug investors.

V8

BullDog wrote:
Presently nearly 3GW being exported on the French interconnector.

I hope it's not got a plug on both ends...

Cheers,

Itsallaguess